Overseeding pastures

[Rob30]

I am planning to overseed my pastures with a seed drill. I will be planting red clover, orchard grass, and annual rye grass. Anybody have experience with this? When should I do it? I am afraid of digging up the wet fields right now.

[uncle Will in In.]

soon as possible. It's supposed to get down to 32f here Thursday night. Might think about doing it while the ground is frozen, if it actually freezes hard enough to get over the field.

[Farmer Joe]

I over seeded ryegrass into my alfalfa late last spring, and thought I threw 50 lbs of seed away. By the 3rd cutting the ryegrass was finally starting to show up in the bales. It looks like it is taking even better this spring. It seems like much of the seed stayed dormant through the dry summer last year. I would suggest planting it as soon as you can get in the field without leaving ruts, than drag it real well to work the seed into the soil.

[Ken Scharabok]

I have the local Farmers' Co-op spread fertilizer for me. I have them add pasture seed to the mix. I'm paying for the spreading service anyway, so might as well get double duty out of it.

[speshuled]

i usually seed mine in the fall .or at least no later than feb. i'm trying to get bermuda started in my fields .it seems like letting the seed sit over the winter helps . also with bermuda it's slow starting here in southern illinois , so i try to mow early so the young bermuda starts aren't crowded out

[Rowdy]

The very few times I have helped/seen overseeding done with a regular seed drill, and not a grass drill we were disappointed. The disks are a bit far about for grass, and it took a long time for the grass to fill in the spaces between the rows. YMMV though. I think if I did it again, I might just let the tubes hang loose from the seed box.